Villainess Review: Gina (Gridlocked)

I fondly remember watching Gridlocked for the first time five years ago; this film was released in Canada in 2015, but received a wider release in the following year. The film centered on two characters: Brody Walker, a notorious, trouble-making celebrity (we've seen a lot of those), and David Hendrix, the leader of a group of SWAT officers. So Brody found himself doing community service as part of another screw-up, and it included being under the watchful eye of Hendrix, with both parties sharing a mutual disdain for the arrangement.

Hendrix introduced Brody to his team, among them being Gina--the group's lone female member. What started out as an introduction ended up becoming a shootout against a group of mercenaries, with Brody caught in the middle. As Hendrix later learns, the mercenaries are actually corrupt SWAT officers led by John Korver, with the sinister gang's motive being greed--they were looking to obtain millions of dollars of bonds from a drug bust. Korver was tricked by Hendrix into believing that he destroyed the bonds, and this was done due to the suspicion that Korver was tipped off.

So to borrow from one of my favorite Looney Tunes quotes, "There's a polecat in the henhouse," and the suspected "polecat" was Scott Calloway, who was pointed out by Gina. A search revealed that Scott had a cellphone in his pocket that was used to contact Korver, leading to Scott being detained--despite him proclaiming his innocence. The rest of the group engaged in a shootout with the mercenaries, but during this point, Brody spotted Gina heading to the mercenaries' truck and taking the bonds out. Hmmm.

After this, Brody went to Scott and released him, while revealing that Gina was the actual traitor in their midst. She used the cellphone and tipped off Korver, and then planted it on Scott to frame him, but while Brody revealed everything to Scott, Gina appeared and fired shots at both of them, as she realized that Brody had seen hear and could reveal her true corruption. Gina gave a simple motive for her heel turn: she did it for the money, making her statement before killing Scott. Brody later shoots Gina, who survives after seeing that the shot struck her jaw, but after a one-on-one brawl, Brody kills Gina with a simple shot to her head.

Without question, the main reason I watched Gridlocked was because of Trish Stratus, a WWE Hall of Famer and seven-time Women's Champion. When I learned about this film, I was really hoping to see a heel Trish Stratus, and boy did she deliver! Even prior to her reveal, Gina was quite the bad-ass, but her heel turn revealed Gina's ruthless and relentless nature, and Stratus really played that to perfection. The main reason why I loved this is simple: I had always wanted Stratus to appear as a heel just once in her part-time appearances on WWE TV (following her original retirement match in 2006), but she never did, so this film more than makes up for it. Gina is, IMO, the best villainess to be played by a wrestling talent, she was just absolutely amazing!

Trish Stratus had made several TV appearances during and after her WWE career, but her very first film came in 2011, portraying lead protagonist Jules Taylor in Bail Enforcers. Stratus' heel role in Gridlocked was her second film appearance, and she did a third film, Christmas in the Rockies, in 2020.

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